The 2 things that will ensure you live a miserable life
Battling an infection & how daily progress was this billionaires secret
I am an entrepreneur that has found success by focusing on daily progress. I share what I learn on the road to wealth. Here are my insights from the week:
Viral or Bacterial: Fighting off an Infection
Daily Progress is what saved Bill Ackman from ruin
Here are 2 things that will ensure you live a miserable life
You can access previous editions of my weekly emails here. Let’s begin!
(1) Viral or Bacterial: Fighting off an Infection
I fell quite unwell.
I don’t know what was the cause. It could have been the change in weather, Delhi’s pollution, or exhaustion. Whatever it was, I knew that my body was fighting off an infection. The cough that I settled on indicated that I had a problem with my lungs.
Usually I allow my body to take on the fight. A fever is the body’s way of triggering an immune response. It’s when my troops are called into action to do their job. I only start looking at medication when the body is unable to beat the evil invaders.
102.3 went beyond normal so I had 650mg Paracetamol to bring down the temperature. But when the Paracetamol wore off, the fever returned with a vengeance. It was like putting a temporary bandaid on the wound.
To figure out how to treat myself I first wanted to know whether I had a bacterial infection or a viral infection. A bacterial infection can be tackled with antibiotics. A viral infection on the other usually requires rest, hydration, and proper nutrition. The body can fight it off on its own.
I ended up trying Orange Health to figure out whether I had a bacterial or viral infection. In a little over 60 minutes, at around 8pm, a phlebotomist turned up at my doorstep.
Just before midnight, the results from my CBC, CRP and ESR pointed towards a viral infection. I had to stick to steam, gargles and sipping on hot teas till my troops declared victory. So that’s what I did.
Insight-1: Do not assume what you have. Diagnose what you have.
Insight-2: Give your body a chance to fight off the infection. The more your immunity fights foreign invaders, the stronger it gets to fight off these invaders in the future.
Insight-3: If you use medicine as your main tool to beat sickness then when you really need these medicines to fight off a serious disease, it won’t be as effective as it should be. You should not be using a machine gun when a knife will do the job.
TRY ORANGE HEALTH
I was very impressed by the speed and service of Orange Health. When you are sick, the last thing you want to do is wait for your test results. This is the fastest turnaround I have ever experienced. It makes total sense why Orange Health is Y-Combinator backed, has grown to all the metros of India, has hit a revenue run rate of 100 crores and recently raised another $35 million. I remember talking to Dhruv, the co-founder, a few years back as we bit into our samosas in Bangalore. I wondered how they are competing with the likes of Tata 1mg and Dr Path Labs. Now I understand how.
People do not want to wait. Just like 10-minute delivery from Blinkit and Zepto has changed the game for e-commerce, Orange Health is changing the game for diagnostics. I will try them next for my comprehensive health checkup reports. I highly recommend you try them too.
(2) Daily Progress is what saved Bill Ackman from ruin
I was listening to how Bill Ackman almost lost everything that he had worked for. His business, his marriage and his money were all headed to the dreaded 0. But he persevered. What really stood out to me however was what he said when he was asked how he was coping with all this pressure psychologically. He said:
“I learnt this method to dealing with these kind of moments which is - you just make a little bit of progress everyday.
So today I am going to wake up, and make a little progress. Make progress with litigation. Make progress with my portfolio. Make progress with my life.
And progress compounds. A bit like money compounds. You don’t see a lot of progress in the first few weeks. But like 30 days in, you will see some. And then 90 days in, you’re like “ok, I was way down there.”
You can’t look up at the mountain top. Because then you’ll give up. You just take it step by step by step.
Just keep making progress, progress, progress. Progress really does compounds and one day you’re like wow, it’s amazing how far I’ve come.
Nutrition, sleep, exercise, a little progress everyday, good friends and family, that’s it.
What he said really struck me because I call myself the “Daily Progress Entrepreneur”. The success I have found has been the result of taking one step in front of another, enjoying the process of the climb, and not worrying about the top or the bottom. If you can make Daily Progress in whatever you do, success will eventually follow.
(3) Here are 2 things that will ensure you live a miserable life
“Mozart was the greatest musical talent maybe that ever lived. And what was his life like? Well he was bitterly unhappy and he died young. What the hell did Mozart do to screw it up?
He overspend his income
He was full of jealousies and resentments
If you overspend your income and be full of jealousy and resentments, you can also have a lousy unhappy life and die young. All you got to do is learn from Mozart.
No matter how hard you try, there is always somebody who achieves more. So what? Does any of us need to be on top of the whole world? it’s ridiculous!”
That’s one of the innumerable lessons from Charlie Munger. I can never get enough of his wit and wisdom.
Harsh Batra (LinkedIn)
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